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It is no secret that like many fields e-sports is currently a male dominated arena. While I would have a hard time believing that the vast majority of people wish for e-sports to remain this way; I believe that the actions of the community don't reflect a desire to inject more females into the culture of e-sports. Several recent events have intrigued me enough to the point that I feel that it would helpful to see what other memebers of the community feel about the matter.
Please be aware that I am not personally attacking any individual in this thread especially considering the fact that they are not responsible for the actions of TL.
The primary events that sparked this thread where the creation of two fan clubs that personally view as extremely premature. Namely the Lindsey Sporrer fanclub and the slayers_eve fan club. IN all honesty besides being born female what have either of these people done to warrant a fan club at all? The sporrer fanclub has 53 pages in 3 days, the day9 fan club in comparison has 134 pages and has been active for over one year.
Do people not realize that the undeserved reverence and vigilant e-staring ( I use staring instead of stalking because I don't believe it has even come close to being appropriate for that term) is one of the reason why women are driven from this industry and other ones like it? If you treat women just like anyone else I guarantee more would be willing to participate in e-sports. The reason why many girls are afraid of even letting people know that they are female online is because of all the fervent attention it will bring upon them. I'm sure that the mmo players among all ave heard the female members of their guild complaining about what happens when people on their server/realm/world w/e you call it figure out that they are female.
Another thing I'd like to comment on is female only tournaments such as http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=230697 . These do nothing but promote the belief that women cannot compete with men in e-sports which to me seems to be nothing but utter ridiculousness. E-sports are for the most part mental activities the physical requirement is not high enough that sexual dimorphism would have any significant effect.
If you want more women in esports stop treating them differently. Women if you want to be treated equally then stop voluntarily segregating yourself with things such as female leagues and tournaments.
Do you think things like the relatively quick fan clubs are hurting or helping the problem?
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Hot chicks get bonuses in life.
It's simple and pretty universal in all aspects of life.
P.S. If women want equality in E-Sports, earn it.
I'm not saying this in a sexist way, but it's realistic. We're currently having Women's Only Soccer games. Why not be Co-Ed? Because it wouldn't be fair.
Whether or not that applies to gaming has yet to be proven (to my knowledge, at least). But if it is truly Co-Ed in people's ability to compete/be a part of, have a woman prove it. Simply demanding equal respect/treatment doesn't make much sense if nothing can be done with it (imo)...
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It has nothing to do with anything you stated. Women generally just don't feel drawn to engage in dedicated, long-term, competition. Look at chess. Look at poker. The disparity between the average female players and the average male players is huge in these fields (doesn't actually have to do with their skill, just the fact that there aren't as many females in these competitions so it's essentially statistically impossible that a female would be at the same level as the top males), and they doesn't even suffer the same problems that you cited as do female e-sports players.
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Imo most women dont really have the desire/drive/competitive urge/whatever you want to call it required for competitive starcraft. I think its a hormone thing. Nothing to do with intellegence or the overwhelmingly male community turning them off. testoster-craft
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Even if that is true what the community is doing certainly doesn't help. Just because things might not be as even as we would like them to be doesn't mean that we shouldn't try to mitigate the things that will make them even worse.
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Isn't this disparity (though maybe not as huge as in E-sports) general for all sports ?
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On July 15 2011 10:18 Nothingtosay wrote:
Even if that is true what the community is doing certainly doesn't help. Just because things might not be as even as we would like them to be doesn't mean that we shouldn't try to mitigate the things that will make them even worse.
What the community is doing basically has no effect, because barriers to entry already existed. take it away and nothing will change because you aren't addressing the basic problem
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Most women don't want to play starcraft.
Also, the sky is blue and 2+2=4
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Your OP is misleading and is bound to start a flame war.
Gender Disparity in Esports != unwarranted fan clubs.
In this particular case there may a connection but would you argue if a Probulous fan club sprung up?
Please clarify what you are trying to say because the women in Esports thing has been done to death.
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I'll probably use some generalizations and wording that may be kind of iffy in this post. This may sound incredibly sexist, but I don't see 'most' women as possessing the same kind of near-obsessive attraction to difficult problem-solving oriented fields that men do. At least whatever type of personality seems to follow that path seems not to proc in females nearly as frequently. Examples include math/science fields of study (this is backed up by statistics, and pretty obvious) and It's likely something in the female brain chemistry, but obviously not well-understood.
My question (and this is not simply pondering, but nearly academic) is why do men like to play games so much and why do women not? What do women spend their time and obsession on that men do not because of our obsession with competition and sports and problem solving?
I doubt an attractive male in a female-dominated area (geographic or professional/topical) would fail to attract a lot of attention from the females in that field. If starcraft was a university, it would be 99% male and the few females there are would obviously receive a massive amount of attention, it's pretty obvious.
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On July 15 2011 10:25 Probulous wrote:
Your OP is misleading and is bound to start a flame war.
Gender Disparity in Esports != unwarranted fan clubs.
In this particular case there may a connection but would you argue if a Probulous fan club sprung up?
Please clarify what you are trying to say because the women in Esports thing has been done to death.
I really don't see why this thread would make anyone angry
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This thread is in my belief, Completely wrong.
Giving attention to woman does in-fact not scare them off. Why? Because you have to show yourself to the community for them to even make a fan club. If you just want to play Starcraft 2 you can, without telling others your gender.
"Do people not realize that the undeserved reverence and vigilant e-staring"
People do realize, but they do it anyway.
It hardly harms anything. If woman want to be seen, they will act in a way to be seen.
"Another thing I'd like to comment on is female only tournaments such as *link*"
You are just being assumptive now, You think female only tournaments are a bad thing for woman in e-sports. Please just stop now.
Do you even consult any female competitors before you made this statement?
I really think, that op's post was made by someone who just hasn't had much female interaction in years.
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On July 15 2011 10:28 Nothingtosay wrote:Show nested quote +On July 15 2011 10:25 Probulous wrote:
Your OP is misleading and is bound to start a flame war.
Gender Disparity in Esports != unwarranted fan clubs.
In this particular case there may a connection but would you argue if a Probulous fan club sprung up?
Please clarify what you are trying to say because the women in Esports thing has been done to death. I really don't see why this thread would make anyone angry
Because these thread tend to go down the following path
OP mentions gender as a factor in ESPORTS/gaming/whatever.
Someone disagrees
People go apeshit because there is a distinct lack of understanding when to comes to females in general.
Have you browsed the blogs section recently. I understand your point, and is why I asked you clarify between the two things you talk about. It is just from experience that pretty much anything that suggests anything about women will turn into a flamewar. I wish it was otherwise, but I am yet to be convinced.
I mean even the threads you mention turned into arguments which have no place in fan club thread.
Besides, if your point is that Fan Clubs get started for no-namers, why the heading? Just seems like you're attention seeking and it detracts from your point.
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Why does the OP and people like him need a reason for a fanclub to exist? People have done much worse with people much less praiseworthy. It's harmless fun, so stop putting your own little spin on it.
E-sports are for the most part mental activities the physical requirement is not high enough that sexual dimorphism would have any significant effect.
There's a study out there stating that female brains are different from male brains. Face it, females and males work differently, mentally and physically. The exact reason why the ratio of female to male pro gamers is so big has yet to be determined.
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I'm sorry, but I may be slightly curt when I respond because I've seen this thread on TL at least 7 times, with the same content.
I think that before you blame the male community for oogling over female personalties (which happens irl anyway), look at the other social constructs.
I have never found a society in which the vast majority think women should be playing video games in general. It's always appeared to me to be the manly (but also generally perceived as lazy, which I crucify people for when they say that) thing to do. Those women who rise above it are the anomaly imo.
Also, I think that the female-only tournaments do not solve the problem you are bringing up, but address a different issue. The female-only tournament I think was meant to help build interest among women, not to specifically be different from a male tournament due to persecution (which is what I feel you are implying slightly) or physical incapability.
My tldr: You analyzed stuff wrong, and hence your conclusion is wrong.
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talk to any of your girl friends op. and ask them why they don't play games. it's not because of the community, it's because that they're just not interested.
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Women don't succeed in esports, because they either lack the will to succeed, or the ability to succeed.
The only barrier to entry is having a computer and time to practice.
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Theres womens only soccer, volleyball and basketball leagues because theres a difference in PHYSICAL attributes.
There should be absolutely no segregation of womens leagues from male starcraft leagues. it makes no sense, because there is no physicality involved in video games.
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Well, I've had this little rant stored up for a while. Ever since the KellyMilkies thing, to be honest.
Let's get your main point out of the way right now: though not stated as articulately as I would like, the first few posters have it right; the main reason you do not see women at the top of the e-sports competitive scene, or any other highly specialized competitive game involving a large amount of skill, is because women are genetically predisposed to be disinterested in competition. Yeah, I said it. Some elements of gender are genetically hardwired.
This isn't to say by any means that we (as men OR women) can't overcome these genetic predispositions; after all, we're rational, self-aware beings, right? If it were impossible to overcome genetic wiring, then I would have to agree with certain radical feminists who say men should pay higher taxes because a disproportionate amount of violent crime is committed by men. Bust THAT one out at your next dinner party and see how well it goes over. The point of this is that we can't really blame sexism in the scene for keeping women out of it. The more we try to tell ourselves as a society that men and women are exactly the same, the more evidence to the contrary we seem to find. Women generally have less interest in competition than men. Simple as that.
That being said, is the scene sexist? God yes. I've never met a bigger group of pigs than a bunch of highly competitive men gathered together specifically for the benefit of whatever they're competing in. In some ways, it's natural. To be competitive at anything that requires the amount of skill that Starcraft (or rugby, or chess) does, one usually has to possess certain traits that make him a dominant force in social situations. The problem is that these traits, especially in YOUNG men, often manifest as borderline sociopathy. Frankly, the way men my age treat women is often pretty appalling. If women are deemed nominally attractive (I believe "hot" is the colloquial here) then they're allowed to do pretty much whatever they want (this is not a good thing, as I'll explain in a moment) as long as they do it with the understanding that they're not ACTUALLY one of the guys, they're just there for eye-candy and hopefully a fuck later. If they're not deemed attractive, they often fight an uphill battle altogether; the link between the anonymity of the internet and rampant douchebaggery is well-documented, and nowhere is it more evident than when men get together to judge a woman's physical appearance instead of her contribution to the community.
That brings me to my next point, which is that women have JUST AS MUCH responsibility as men for changing the perception of the scene. Take the KellyMilkies fiasco:
For those that don't know, KellyMilkies is a middling Starcraft player that did some casting for GSL a few seasons back. And that just about sums up her entire SC career. From there, she did a photo shoot in her underwear for a men's magazine and proceeded to plaster it all over the internet.
When the shit hit the fan, the thread her shoot was posted in was immediately bogged down with two kinds of posts: those saying she had no business doing a photo shoot at all and those saying that those that didn't like her photo shoot were sexist - and probably gay.
I'll say it right now: I was disgusted by the shoot. I never posted in that thread, because the whole thing was a cluster-fuck, but I was absolutely appalled. The problem is that 99% of her detractors were posting ad hominem insults about her physical appearance, instead of the deeper underlying issue with the shoot: this woman, who has barely if at all done ANYTHING for our scene, is now trying to buy her way into it using her sexuality. THAT, friends, is the definition of sexism, and we had every right and reason to run her out of town.
The problem with this is that if Kelly had been percieved as more physically attractive, I'm almost certain that a lot of those negative posts wouldn't exist. And holy SHIT if that doesn't smack of patriarchy (a word I'm really, REALLY loathe to use, by the way) I don't know what does. So women that do jack shit for the community get a free pass, as long as they're deemed by a group of oversexed 20-somethings as "hot" enough to fuck? (Sporrer, I'm looking at you.)
Women need to stop using their sexuality as an "easy-in" to what's percieved as a boys-only club. This goes for any male dominated scene (heavy metal music particularly comes to mind). Women have just as much of a responsibility to contribute to the community they want to be a part of, and if the only way they can think of to gain acceptance is to show their tits, then they shouldn't be surprised when they get treated like sex objects.
I realize this ran kind of long, so let me sum it up:
Sexism isn't the main reason women don't compete at high levels. Women just don't like to compete. That said, sexism does exist, and it goes BOTH ways, and BOTH sexes have a responsibility to stop it.
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Women can compete equally in things such as politics but in gaming and sports they are at a disadvantage. Anything that involves reaction times, physical speed and strength men will excel at over women because men have evolved over millions of years as hunters.
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EPT
